Latest: Minister to announce plans to help hard-pressed renters next month

Update 1.45pm: Minister for Housing Simon Coveney has said that he will be announcing plans to ease pressure on renters next month.

Minister Coveney says the rate of inflation in the market is unsustainable and needs to be tackled.

His comments comes as a new Savills report predicts that rents will rise by 19% in Dublin and 14% outside the capital by the end of 2018.

Minister Coveney said that the situation needs to be managed carefully.

“We’re going to announce the detail of that in about a month’s time,” he said.

“But the balance is, first of all we need to recognise that some renters are under massive pressure.

“It is not sustainable to see rental inflation at the pace that it’s currently happening, and we need to respond to that, but we need to respond to it in a way that doesn’t actually shut off the appetite to invest in new rental accommodation either.”

Earlier:

Minister for Housing Simon Coveney has said that he is determined to avoid bad planning of the past in future social housing developments.

Minister Coveney said that his plans for thousands of new homes will be built in mixed public-private developments.

It comes as a new Savills Report predicted that rents will rise by 19% in Dublin and 14% outside the capital by the end of 2018.

Minister Coveney said that good planning is key to solving the housing crisis.

"I am determined to ensure that if we are going to add 50,000 houses to the social housing stock in Ireland, we are not going to do what was done in the 70s and 80s, whereby you build all the social houses in one part of a city, and you allow only private houses to be built in other parts of cities," he said.

"That is a recipe for social disadvantage, but it’s also a recipe for political unrest, understandably, as people feel they are locked out of progress and opportunity."

The Government is facing fresh claims that it is failing to address spiralling health waiting list delays after a patient was told a hospital could not see him for a neurological condition until at least 2024.